Microsoft lawsuit in EU over packaging IE (again)

Can someone tell me why we feel the need to harass Microsoft for bundling IE on their own flipping OS?

Without IE, I wouldnt’ be able to get online very easily, to go download Chrome or FF or Opera or whatever.

If MS is forced to remove IE, they should also have to remove every MS-made operating system driver. By the gods, they are taking away my ability to choose which driver powers my DVD burner!! To hell with MS and their packaged drivers!

Get real, you idiots. Let them package their browser. Apple does. Ubuntu packages someone ELSE’s browser in their operating system! If that isn’t deplorable (by the lawsuit’s standards) then I don’t know what is!

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Brent(05:20:33) :

Yeah, sure. Microsoft categorically abused monopoly powers, threatening to back out of contracts with PC sellers who sold systems with any other browsers installed. (among other things.) In losing court cases against numerous governments throughout the world, Microsoft officers habitually perjured themselves in court in attempts to sway proceedings. Upon losing court cases against numerous governments throughout the world, Microsoft avoided complying with many of the sentences levied against them, holding out until the competitors Microsoft was committing crimes against had gone out of business.

Beyond the history, it’s speculation if Microsoft would be free to conduct business without legal interference had they conducted themselves differently in the previous cases. My personal opinion is that, in abusing its monopoly power, Microsoft has denied every PC user from the better browsers and improved technologies that other companies were developing. Although it has caught up some, it is still far behind the features and security of other browsers. It’s quite likely true that, if not for MS trying to leverage its monopoly power to force IE as part of the OS, you would be able to much more easily get online to go download Chrome or FF or Opera or whatever.

I realize perfectly well that MS has been bully in the past, but … when it comes down to it, it’s still their freakin OS. They can frankly do whatever they want with it. My argument is that packaging their own browser in the OS has got nothing to do with a monopoly. Their behavior might be deplorable, but it’s not “illegal” to protect your interests. We’ve seen the figures though.. Firefox has been stealing away IE users whether MS packages IE or not! I fail to see the monstrosity.

I am definitely NOT a fan of IE. I’ve used pretty much every other browser known to man, including text based ones for linux, and like them better than IE.

By including IE, MS is not forcing anybody to use it permanently. The uninformed people who use IE simply because it’s already there are the same people who get viruses and spyware on their machines even if they use Firefox. They don’t know about Adblock, or NoScript, etc. Including IE is often motivating for technical users to actively think “hey, I need to get something other than IE on here”.

Yeah… but even if they do it, it’s not *really* being sold without IE. It’s built into the OS too tightly. I’d bet anything that if you look through the Program Files, that you’ll still find the stuff there, just a little more stripped down.

(I don’t know how they expect people to get online to find a different browser without something to kick things off with.)